Yeah, the two NFL who met her are Samoan and the claim is they met her way out at American Samoa IIRC, not in Cali. The Arizona guy and the AZ guy says Polamalu also met her. It will be interesting to see if Troy confirms that, denies that, or just stays the hell away from all this.

Some time during his first days on campus, his teammates most likely tried to get him to hook up with some drunk chick overly willing to make it with the star football player, and he quickly came up with the "I can't - I have a girlfriend" cover story, and it just snowballed from there.

"Thirdly, our investigators through their work were able to discover online chatter among the perpetrators that is sort of the ultimate proof of this, the joy they were taking, the sort of casualness with which among themselves they were referring to what they had accomplished and what they had done."

Jim_Tressel's_O-Face:czetie: And if he is fabulating, it's not merely Making Stuff Up on the level of a Canadian girlfriend; he sincerely believes his own fiction.

Baron von Mantihausen?

muwaryer: There was absolutely no reason for ND to unequivocally support Te'o.

The Catholic school that earned its following flaunting the legends of 'winning one for the Gipper' and 'Rudy' certainly wouldn't double down on claiming the new legend of their star linebacker's dead girlfriend was just a cruel internet hoax and not anything that could be further damaging to the university football program. Nope, they're completely trustworthy here, cross their hearts and swear on Touchdown Jesus(tm).

I get where you're coming from...but this one is going to be very easy to prove/disprove. It would be a colossal mistake for ND to double down on this one unless they are 100% sure. I'm not saying that they're right -- Te'o may have duped them too -- but I do think they're convinced that they're right.

halfof33:"Thirdly, our investigators through their work were able to discover online chatter among the perpetrators that is sort of the ultimate proof of this, the joy they were taking, the sort of casualness with which among themselves they were referring to what they had accomplished and what they had done."

Peter King @SI_PeterKingRT @slacker_mike: Why did major outlets like SI, ESPN not identify this with fact checking?

In fairness, I can probably understand taking people at their word for it if there's a whole family talking about how they knew this person. Most of the time you're not going to assume they're lying and go check for a death certificate. If it were for a book, sure. For a random article or a brief mention on TV? Let's not assume reporters have all f*cking day to work on just one story.

Pete Thamel was in South Bend for four days working on that story. Notre Dame limited access to Manti Te'o to the last of those four days.

Peter King @SI_PeterKingRT @slacker_mike: Why did major outlets like SI, ESPN not identify this with fact checking?

In fairness, I can probably understand taking people at their word for it if there's a whole family talking about how they knew this person. Most of the time you're not going to assume they're lying and go check for a death certificate. If it were for a book, sure. For a random article or a brief mention on TV? Let's not assume reporters have all f*cking day to work on just one story.

The scandal isn't going to be why they didn't fact check the story before the hoax was revealed. The scandal is going to be why they didn't report on it until their hand was forced by a blog.

It's pretty obvious, if not a factual certainty at this point, that this story was deliberately spiked by some members of the media

halfof33:"Thirdly, our investigators through their work were able to discover online chatter among the perpetrators that is sort of the ultimate proof of this, the joy they were taking, the sort of casualness with which among themselves they were referring to what they had accomplished and what they had done."

Whoever finds this first is going to be Internet famous.

What happened to the power of Fark?

More likely that this "online chatter" doesn't exist. ND has already said that they aren't going to release the "internal findings." Like I said above, it sounds to me like they believe they've closed the loop.Of course, I could be wrong about this. I'm certainly engaging in some conjecture myself.

ATRDCI:Yes, I am aware. My point was that the only "built story" around Manziel, other than the nickname, was slightly misleading terminology when regarding him as a freshman

"After Johnny Manziel's first media appearance, Joe Posnanski wrote a gushing essay on the 2012 Heisman Trophy winner, dripping with the nostalgia evoked by a nickname like "Johnny Football." After he talked about how refreshing it was that Manziel's long media silence spared him from overexposure, you couldn't tell if Posnanski was talking about Manziel or Mickey Mantle. He lamented how they don't make 'em like they used to -- even placing scrambling quarterbacks in that category, as if no one's told him about MACtion -- before becoming enthralled by the "aww shucks" aesthetic accompanied by things like Manziel's modest statement that he didn't "see [himself] as Johnny Football."

Well, here's the other thing about that media silence -- it allowed people like Posnanski to create the "Johnny Football" of their dreams. Truth is, the real Johnny Manziel is out here flashing the money he won at a casino on Twitter. He might sip champagne here and there. He sits courtside at NBA games, and when people have a problem with any of it, he either tells them to keep hating or stop. He doesn't seem to give a damn either way, but he's not stopping because they don't like it. Johnny Manziel wants to ball. Not just on the field, but in his life. He retweets 50 Cent lyrics to reinforce this. Oh, and he goes back and forth with Larry Fitzgerald, Bubba Watson and some guys I'm told I should be aware of." Full article with links here.

And as a PR person I find it funny that BOTH of the top Heisman finalists were helped dramatically by complete bullsh*t stories that had nothing to do with their production on the field.

I'm not saying that neither deserved to be there, I'd just remind people that Manziel wasn't allowed to talk to the press while A&M created a whole image for him that also seems to be BS. Te'o was allowed to talk to the press apparently with a made-up story.

/also, never even heard of Te'o's story before this either//it's amazing how much bullsh*t you escape when you don't watch ESPN or other crap sports programming that gives you zero information about sports and 100% fabricated crap to "humanize" the athletes

The only really misleading thing about Manziel was that announcers kept calling him a redshirt freshman, while hours-wise he is actually a junior

/hell the family had to take control of the "story" so that there wouldn't be NCAA violations because somebody sold Johnny Football Tshirts or something like that

Redshirt freshman refers to the fact that he redshirted during his first year of college. Manziel this year played during his first year of eligibility (his second year in college). Next year he'll be a redshirt sophomore, which means he's been with the program for three years but will be playing in just his sophomore year of eligibility. Two years from now, assuming he doesn't go to the NFL, he'll be a fifth-year senior and will exhaust his eligibility.

Yes, I am aware. My point was that the only "built story" around Manziel, other than the nickname, was slightly misleading terminology when regarding him as a freshman

It's not misleading at all to people who know what the term means. He's a first-year player. He and a true freshman, before this year, had the exact same playing time experience - none. It's the first time a f ...

Yeah, I understand that, and its more a personal hang up than anything that's actually significant. Its just to me, even though he doesn't have the experience, he still had the workouts/body development, that a junior has. I mean, take the Europeans drafted in the NBA. You'd expect a 25 year old whose been playing in Euro leagues for say 5 years to do better than a 21 year old from St John's even though they are both rookes because the european has had more time to develop his body

/tbh, not that big a deal, the reason I brought it up is that while he wasn't allowed to talk to the media, there really has been zero story building by the university in regards to him//I'll try to stop thread jacking

muwaryer:I get where you're coming from...but this one is going to be very easy to prove/disprove. It would be a colossal mistake for ND to double down on this one unless they are 100% sure. I'm not saying that they're right -- Te'o may have duped them too -- but I do think they're convinced that they're right.

Maybe. I've just seen enough unforced errors from people and institutions in the sport that should have known better. After Sandusky, nothing really surprises me any more.

ha-ha-guy:CADMonkey79: Or maybe they are just trying to cover for him.

Yeah, the two NFL who met her are Samoan and the claim is they met her way out at American Samoa IIRC, not in Cali. The Arizona guy and the AZ guy says Polamalu also met her. It will be interesting to see if Troy confirms that, denies that, or just stays the hell away from all this.

ATRDCI:/tbh, not that big a deal, the reason I brought it up is that while he wasn't allowed to talk to the media, there really has been zero story building by the university in regards to him

The story building is done by the media, which is helped by not having the QB act like a typical dumbsh*t 20-year-old. So everyone runs with the "Johnny Football" crap and all the old-school imagery it evokes while never hearing the dumbsh*t stuff he does on Twitter and how he's going to NBA games courtside, going to casinos and flashing money all over the place, etc. (All of which is legal, BTW, but it's nowhere near the image they made of the guy).

AliceBToklasLives:As someone pointed out in the last thread, Manti said he would talk to her over the phone all frickin' night and would sometimes wake up hearing her snore on the other end of the line.

Either:

(A) That's one dedicated group of pranksters(B) Manti is in on it

/the answer is (B)

Also, that's a pretty good phone plan if someone not making illegal money on the side while in college can do that.

AliceBToklasLives:As someone pointed out in the last thread, Manti said he would talk to her over the phone all frickin' night and would sometimes wake up hearing her snore on the other end of the line.

Either:

(A) That's one dedicated group of pranksters(B) Manti is in on it

/the answer is (B)

Especially when you consider the hoaxter was a guy and would have had to convinced some girl to be that dedicated.

I just overheard this part of a conversation at lunch from some mouthbreather: "You know, Troy Polamalu sounds kinda gay when he talks. I wonder if they're all gay together and he's just helping to cover it all up? It will be interesting to see what he has to say about this."

srhp29:PsyLord: Well, I'll give him the benefit of the doubt... but it looks like a lie that Lance Armstrong would approve of.

There is no doubt in my mind that he lied at some point. Just not sure at which point.

There is also the possibility that many were involved in this ruse and that the "chatter" was part of the cover up.

Seems like this lie was also pretty unnecessary unless he was trying to score some sympathy points for the Heisman or something. But then again, if he did win any awards, the truth would come out later to tarnish it. So I'm not sure what the thinking was behind this whole thing if it was a lie to begin with.